Boots’s stance on the morning-after pill shows its hypocrisy

As women, we are used to our sexuality, and particularly the uterus, being appropriated and controlled by God’s servants, priests, imams, rabbis and vicars – not to mention the state.

Control is deployed by various cultural and legalistic means on a continuum stretching from social ostracism, to violent abominations as in the heinous human rights abuse that is female genital mutilation.

So now we have a new contender for this patriarchal role – Boots the Chemist.

Claiming the moral high ground in the implementation of capitalism, Boots has deemed the morning-after pill unsuitable for the hoi polloi. In a letter to the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, Boots’ chief pharmacist Marc Donovan said: “…lowering the price of emergency contraception could lead the firm to be accused of incentivising [sic] inappropriate use of such drugs”, presumably by shop girls, cleaners, teenagers from sink estates and the like.

There is no mention of what it is that Mr Donovan is taking, but his use of English is unique and his moral compass points firmly to, profit. Naturally we are not surprised by this, although somewhat taken aback by the hypocrisy of a firm that banks offshore.